Postgame questions: What happened on Alex Smith’s pick?

Answering some questions (my own) after the 49ers’ 17-3 preseason win over the Raiders on Saturday night:

Q: What happened on Alex Smith’s interception?

A: Smith said he didn’t see Raiders defensive end Matt Shaughnessy, who dropped 10 yards downfield and picked him off in front of Vernon Davis.

“I just assumed it was man-to-man and saw the inside leverage on the defender inside Vernon and totally assumed that I had saw the corner off,” Smith said. “Totally assumed that I had free access over there and didn’t see him, obviously, until I let it go.”

It was, of course, a classic Smith mistake and marred an otherwise excellent performance. He completed 8 of his other 12 passes for 126 yards with two of those incompletions being a drop by Delanie Walker and a kinda-drop by Braylon Edwards, who had the ball wrestled loose after making a near-catch over the middle.

Said Jim Harbaugh of Smith’s interception, “We talked about it. We feel like it’s a correctable thing. We know why it happened and we have to do a little better job with our eyes and we will get that corrected.”

Q: Speaking of Edwards, that was some catch, huh?

A: My colleague Gwen Knapp wrote about Edwards here, but, yes, that was a rather effortlessly looking, one-handed, 32-yard grab by Edwards. What other Niners receiver in recent years makes that type of grab? Brandon Lloyd? Yes, I suppose that’s true. Anyone else?

Q: What was the problem in the red zone?

A: The play-calling, mostly, which was a reflection of Harbaugh’s desire to keep much of the offense under wraps in the preseason.

The Niners had six first-half plays inside the Oakland 10-yard line and called five runs, handing the ball to Anthony Dixon on 3rd-and-goal from the 2 and 3rd-and-goal from the 5.

I’m guessing that won’t happen in the regular season.

Q: Is Andy Lee OK?

A: The Niners punter stayed in the game after he was decked following a botched field goal, but he was clearly hurting. He had to be helped up by placekicker David Akers after holding on field goals and extra points. Akers took over Lee’s punting duties.

Harbaugh said of Lee’s injury “I don’t believe it’s a serious thing” — giving more injury information with those words than he had offered during all of training camp.

Q: What were the best postgame quotes?

A: Here’s Kendall Hunter on what he’s learned about running in the NFL: “You can’t tap your feet too long. In the NFL, if there’s a hole right there and you don’t hit it then, you ain’t going to get through there.”

Here’s Alex Smith on getting sandwiched by Richard Seymour and Tommy Kelly as he completed a 14-yard pass to Edwards: “Those are the kinds of things I think they look worse than they are, those types of hits … When you complete them they feel better. When they are incomplete they hurt a little bit more. But you hear the roar and you see the guy run (with) the ball, you feel OK.”